spainlinx0

I would never have gotten Tivo if it wasn't for the Directivo. I just think that paying that high amount of money up front, and still paying a 12.95 a month is a little bit too pricey since you only have one tuner.

If I had cable I would probably just settle for a Cable DVR. Thankfully I have Directv, and can enjoy my Tivo.

joltaddict

Directivo is the greatest thing since Hohos, breast implants, and blowjobs.

Easy

This is why I can't understand the monthly programming fee. Can they seriously not sell this viewing habit data to networks? The networks won't buy it? If Nielsen can make money at this TIVO should be able to also. I think the tradeoff should be user data for free programming data. Seems fair.

Josh H

As a very, very casual tv viewer, I passed on both (though I did have a stand alone Tivo I won in a contest a few years back, but it crapped out after about 6 months).

I was interested in the Comcast DVR, but not for $10 a month on top of my already way overpriced digital cable bill, especially after reading comments that mirrored yours in saying that they're pretty crappy.

JasonF

You don't have to pay the monthly fee, and you can use your TiVo to record manually by time and channel.

Ted The Bug

Can anyone summarize what makes the cable company's DVRs so inferior?

Josh H

And pretty much everyone already has a VCR that does just that, so that leaves little reason to by a Tivo for anyone not wanting to pay a monthly fee or buy a lifetime subscription.

Decker

Well, Hohos are very unhealthy, breast augmentation surgery can have very serious health complications, and that third example has convinced me to go out and buy a Tivo.



But seriously... I really don't mind my DVR much at all. I can certainly live without the Tivo features just fine if the damned thing would just allow me to record the same program every week. My 10 year old VCR could record "Weekly", so why can't this? Other than that, I don't need a box to decide if a program is a repeat or conclude I might be gay since I watch Sex and the City and Trading Spaces. I think the second tuner is a much bigger deal, since it allows me to record two programs at once -- I can finally record Scrubs and 24 or Friends and Survivor without having to go into my bedroom to watch one of the programs. Figure in the huge cost savings and I'm plenty happy. I, like many others I imagine, figured I already know how to operate a VCR and didn't want to spend a lot of money to add a DVR service. This cable box seems to be working out just fine for me.

Also, somebody mentioned you can use TIVO like a VCR without paying for the monthly service, but it's my understanding that this is no longer the case with the newer units.

Red Dog

Call Comcast and tell them that you are considering switching to a dish and ask what they will do to keep your business. Ask them to include a DVR in the new deal. I did this on Friday and got a much better deal - sliced my bill by $25 while basically trading Cinemax for a DVR in the process. Plus I'll be dumping HBO after Sopranos is over in a month so that will save me another $16.

Red Dog

Only with series 1 TIVOs can you do this. You can't do this with Series 2 TIVOs.

Jadzia

The only way they could make DirecTivo better is if it could go down on me. Or at the very least, if they added a Home Media Option.

al_bundy

I did the math on this. Time Warner is $8.95 a month. For me it is $108 a month. It's $550 for the 80 hour TIVO including lifetime service. That means you need to own the TIVO for 5 years to break even compared to the cable DVR. Chances are that you are going to upgrade before then and so the cable is cheaper. The question is how often will the cable companies upgrade their DVR boxes with new features compared to a TIVO?

Red Dog

Particularly to an HD-DVR. I think TIVO's version is rolling out for DirecTV sometime this year.

twikoff

on an unrelated note.. and i havent read the thread, so not sure if its been pointed out..

but replaytv is having a contest.. all replay owners will start seeing random codes when they pause their boxes tomorrow.. and those codes can be entered online for a chance to win some pretty nice AV prizes

Red Dog

Yeah, I saw that when I paused mine last night.

twikoff

i saw it lastnight and was wondering wtf
i mentioned it to one of my friends at work today, that got in on the replaytv snafu with me.. and he said him and his wife noticed it come up lastnight, and sat there hitting buttons without reading it, till it went away.. so he didnt know what it said

JM

It is this kind of thinking that makes ReplayTVs and Tivos a hard sell to the average person. There is MUCH more to a ReplayTV than a 40GB hard drive. Let's start with the hardware. Keep in mind that the current *retail* price of a ReplayTV 5540 or 5040 is $150 (not $300), which does not include activation ($299 lifetime OR $12.95/month). If you look, they can even be had for less than that--around $115. A ReplayTV includes the following components (among others):

1) A quality hardware MPEG-2 encoder AND decoder. By way of comparison, the Hauppage WinTV-PVR-350 Hardware MPEG encoder/decoder PCI card for a PC retails for $199 ALONE, and from what I've heard it produces worse video quality than a ReplayTV/Tivo.

2) An NTSC tuner

3) The aforementioned hard drive

4) Various video output chips for composite, s-video, and progressive component output

5) Digital Output Audio (TOSLink)

6) USB port (currently non-functional)

7) Ethernet

8) Modem

9) CPU and RAM

10) Power supply

11) Motherboard with various other chips

12) Standard A/V component-size case

Then you have the ReplayTV software itself. This is sophisticated software that took many man-hours and $$$ to develop and to continue to develop.

There are also many miscellaneous costs.

1) Licensing fees from vxWorks (the OS ReplayTV uses), MPEG LA (for MPEG-2 use), etc.

2) The ReplayTV employees that develop the software, put together the Zones content, do tech support, etc. All these people like to be paid.

3) The cost of maintaining dial-up access for older models and those without broadband access for newer models.

As you can see, there is a lot more involved than one might initially think.

The $13/mo. or $299 lifetime isn't for programming. It is an activation fee. Basically, ReplayTV sells the units for a loss at $150, and the activation fee is what allows them to make a profit. Also, ReplayTV never offered this for free as you say. Initially, it was just bundled into the purchase price. For example a 30GB ReplayTV 3xxx model retailed for $599. This turned out to be a horrible idea because it made ReplayTVs *appear* to be twice as much as a comparable Tivo, which had split the activation fee from the base price from the very beginning. This greatly contributed to Tivo getting the dominant market share even though ReplayTV actually invented the DVR first...

CaptainMarvel

I love my Tivos, but I just wish TiVo would do something about double-charging me with fees. I have two TiVo's, and I'm paying $12.95 a month for each. It would sure be nice to pay $12.95 total, or to have the second unit's monthly fee reduced.

joltaddict

I just want a TiVo with a third tuner.

JM

See my above post regarding ReplayTVs. Tivo is in the same position--actually worse. The fees are part of the true cost of the units--think of it as a lease. As it is, Tivo is not in great financial shape. Thanks to its new owner D&M, ReplayTV is in better financial shape than Tivo; however, neither can afford to just stop charging these activation fees and take losses on the hardware.

Jeremy517

That isn't accurate. If you buy, you have equity. I could sell my 3 year old TiVo for probably $700 right now. I paid less than that, including the price of the lifetime subscription.

JM

There aren't even dual tuner ReplayTVs or Tivos (DirecTivo is entirely different), and you already want one with three tuners? They better get on it!

joltaddict

Only for sunday and tuesday.
The dual is fine for the rest of the week.

SirPablo

I've had a TiVo since Sept 2000. It was the best purchase I've ever made. I see the $13/mo as a small fee to pay for the service. I am paying a monthly fee to access the TiVo programming data.

My TiVo is connected to the internet (through USB adapter) and my home network. This allows my TiVo to connect several times to the internet a day. I also have the Home Media Option, which not only allows my to stream MP3s and images off my computer to my TV/home theater system, but I can schedule recordings online. This comes in handy if I'm at the office and I forgot to set a recording...I can simply do it from my PC at the office.

I have a TiVo. My brother has a TiVo. My parents have a TiVo. My fiancee has a TiVo. It's just amazing how well they work. I challenge anyone to show me a cable PVR that works as well as TiVo.

BlackCapTen

I have an upgraded ReplayTV unit and my local cable company's DVR.

I only use my local cable DVR to record HDTV programs and movies (like CSI, Sopranos, etc.) Of course it eats up a lot of hard drive space but its better than nothing. The software on the DVR is a peice of crap and I stick with the ReplayTV for all other shows/stations that are not HDTV.